Every Hero Needs a Tragic Backstory
by faequeentitania
Summary: Agents of Cracked. Daniel feels like he knows Michael pretty well by now. He's realizing, though, that while he may KNOW Michael, he doesn't know much ABOUT him. They say curiosity killed the cat, but he's faced death enough times by now not to be afraid, right? Daniel O'Brien/Michael Swaim


**A/N:** So apparently I have this habit of taking comedy and injecting it with a bunch of angst and feels...? I'm kind of sorry?

Like a lot of Daniel's impulse decisions, the spontaneous invitation for Michael to come with him to the east coast was one that he was now second-guessing.

He didn't regretted it, exactly; somehow and completely against his will, Michael had chipped and pried and wormed his way into Dan's life and (God help him) heart. He was far more comfortable with Michael's brand of chaos than he ever thought he would be, which was slightly unnerving. The strange times he _wasn't_ being a vexing agent of chaos, Michael was actually genuinely funny, far more intelligent than he let on, and sometimes he was even sweet.

So he didn't regret it per se, but it became clear as time moved forward that though he _knew_ Michael, (knew what made him tick, how to get his attention and actually hold onto it for a while, what made him angry and what made him happy) he was realizing he didn't really know much _about_ Michael.

He knew he was a demigod. He knew that he had grown up on the west coast, as was evidenced by his confused, weird stereotypes about the east coast. But beyond that Dan just wasn't sure.

Michael claimed to have been a judge, and would occasionally burst out with dazzling displays of legal knowledge, but for all Daniel knew that could have been some hallucination/fever dream brought on by watching too many daytime court shows.

Daniel had a list of odd facts about Michael that he had no idea if they were true or not because he had never taken the time to verify, too preoccupied with trying to keep his job and keep Michael out of trouble. But now he was starting to wonder and curiosity was beginning to gnaw at him.

He tried asking Michael first; get a baseline that he could do his own research on later, verify fact and fiction. For someone who loved to talk as much as Michael did, he was surprisingly vague about this.

"Tell me about your life," Dan murmured against Michael's throat.

It was some ungodly time in the wee hours of the morning, and the only reason Dan was even awake was because Michael had decided that a boner (whether the person was conscious or not while they had it) should never go to waste.

All in all, waking up to Micheal sucking his dick wasn't the worst thing in the world, even if he was too tired and groggy to do much besides make breathy noises and lay clumsy hands encouragingly on Michael's head.

He didn't even mind Michael dry humping against his hip afterwards, even if Michael's spunk got his shirt, because the man could kiss infuriatingly well. Even the taste of cum lingering in Michael's mouth couldn't detract from it.

Daniel liked this bit, though. After the orgasms, when Michael was relaxed and blessedly still. He kind of wished he had learned how pliable Michael was after coming ages ago; it would have made his job a bit easier.

It was just nice, as well, if he was being honest. Michael could be extraordinarily affectionate, and loathe as Daniel was to admit it, affection was something he felt starved for. Having permission to cuddle up like this, warm and intimate and _wanted_ ; it was the best thing Dan had ever felt.

"Hm?" Michael grunted sleepily, long fingers tracing nonsensical patterns along Dan's shoulders.

"Tell me about your life," Daniel repeated, "Everything prior to meeting me. Where you grew up, your family, your jobs, Cracked. Anything."

Michael was uncharacteristically quiet, though the pattern he was drawing with his fingers on Dan's back didn't falter.

"You know all the important stuff already, silly-face," Michael finally answered, reaching up to tug on Dan ear, "And no one likes reruns."

"Humor me," Dan pleaded gently, squeezing his arm around Michael's chest just a little tighter, "Tell me about your mom, or your first pet, or the street you grew up on."

"Boring," Michael deflected, suddenly in motion, and Dan found himself pushed onto his back with Michael looming over him in the near black of the room, "I'd rather get you off again. You squeak when you come, did you realize that? Kind of like a mouse getting stepped on. It's kind of cute."

It was frightening him, a little, how adamantly Michael was avoiding talking about his past. Frightening and intensely mysterious in a way that only made Dan's curiosity more intense.

"I do not," he answered instead of pushing it, and even in the darkness he could tell Michael was smiling.

"Do too," Michael insisted, rolling his hips against Daniel's in a way far too good to be legal, "I'll prove it."

Daniel allowed himself to be distracted by Michael's purposeful ministrations. Curiosity still burned in the back of his head, but he knew when to take a temporary retreat. If that temporary retreat included Michael making him come so hard he passed out, all the better.

At the end of the day, Daniel liked to think he was a decent guy. He was nice and polite to strangers, he always tipped his servers, he never cut anyone off in traffic. This extended to his professional life as well, and though he was "technically" dead, he still had enough people in the know that he felt comfortable requesting a favor or two from them.

He checked his email for the fifth time in half an hour. He was supposed to be getting something from a journalist friend he had met in college, who had done some digging for him. The suspense was killing him, and he bounced his knee impatiently at his desk as he waited.

His current job was not as exciting as Cracked had been (granted, he didn't think many places had the same level of danger that Cracked did), but it was still a writing job and it paid the bills. At the moment it was the best he could ask for.

His phone buzzed, but instead of the email notification he was expecting, a mysterious phone call illuminated the screen. He frowned, squinting for a second at the nonsensical symbols where a phone number should be.

With fear like a lead weight sinking into his stomach, he realized it could only be one person.

"Heh... hello?" he stammered, as a high-frequency white noise whined through the phone's little speaker.

"Hello, Daniel," The Chief's deep and eerie voice cut right into his eardrum, and he winced. Fuck.

"Chief," he said simply, then swallowed nervously, "To what do I owe-"

"You are digging into dangerous territory, O'Brien," The Chief interrupted him, voice sharp as a razor, "Just what the fuck do you think you're doing?"

Dan could feel the color drain out of his face, and he opened and closed his mouth soundlessly several times.

"I'm... I'm just..."

"You're both supposed to be dead," The Chief barked, "There shouldn't be anyone looking into the background of two internet comedy dicks, you're risking exposing yourself, O'Brien! This ends. Now."

"I deserve to know!"

Dan was shocked at the anger that burst out of his mouth. Apparently The Chief was as well, as there was nothing but ominous silence on the other end of the line for several long moments.

When it seemed safe to assume that The Chief wasn't going to make his head explode or any other graphically violent death, Dan took a deep breath and pressed on, "I deserve to know. I've given up everything for him. I have endured pain, and near death. I've given up my job and my fucking identity! I deserve to know about the man I've turned my life upside down for!"

There was silence on the other end of the line, and then a slow build of white noise. Dan ground his teeth, determined to hold his ground. He's been pushed around by this man far too much already.

"Fine," the white noise cut out, and Dan let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. It took his ringing ears a second to catch up.

"What?" he asked softly, hardly daring to believe it.

"You'll get your files, O'Brien," The Chief growled, "Everything you need to know about Michael. Expect them by the end of today."

"Really?"

"Don't make me change my mind, O'Brien."

"Right."

The line went dead, and Dan pulled the phone slowly away from his ear, surprised he had come away from that conversation without any of his orifices bleeding.

It was going to be a long day.

The end of Daniel's day drew closer, and still no sign of the promised files. Maybe The Chief had been lying. Maybe he said he was going to give Dan the files just to give himself more time to destroy them instead.

Dan's stomach felt sour with disappointment. He just felt so _tired_ ; tired of being a doormat, tired of being just a plaything for these supernatural creatures that had somehow taken over his life.

Dan turned to gather up his stuff, frustrated and disappointed, and was shocked to find a huge pocket binder on his desk when he turned back around. It was brown and nondescript, with a simple string holding it closed.

Quickly he stood up and looked around, heart racing and palms beginning to sweat.

Not another soul in sight; Dan's hopeful wait for the delivery of the promised information making him the last one in the office.

His heart beat faster, and he looked again to the brown folder.

He sat back down, suddenly nervous. He was pretty sure there wasn't anything in Michael's past that could possibly make Daniel leave him; Dan felt fairly confident that he was beyond being shocked anymore.

Still, apprehension turned in his stomach. He was afraid to know almost as much as he wanted to know.

"Okay," he whispered to himself, rolling up his sleeves and taking a breath, "Okay."

He unbound the string and began.

Several hours and multiple cups of breakroom coffee later, and Dan took off his glasses, rubbing his eyes.

He wasn't exactly sure what he had been expecting, but it wasn't... that.

He looked around at the piles again. They were all official documents, ranging from police reports to medical records; each pocket of the folder like a snapshot from Michael's life.

He rifled through the first pile again. School records, mostly, sprinkled with achievement awards and report cards.

That wasn't terribly surprising, to be honest. Between the hacking and the random burst of incredible knowledge, Daniel had always kind of known that Michael was some sort of savant. It was surprising to see it reflected in straight A's, however. Dan always thought Michael wouldn't have the discipline to take tests and do homework.

The second pile is what disturbed him more. A string of eviction notices under Michael's mother's name, along with applications for food stamps and unemployment.

It was clear that Michael had grown up poor, and Daniel couldn't help but feel sad and frustrated on his behalf; where the hell was The Chief all those years?

He moved on to the next pile, just college acceptance letters and an outpouring of scholarships; those straight A's certainly didn't go to waste. He flipped to the bottom of the pile, and ran his fingers over the raised seal on Michael's Harvard diploma. He almost couldn't believe that that was true, but here it was.

He couldn't help but smile at the next stack of papers. A mix of newspaper clippings and inter-office documents chronicling Michael's ascent through the justice system. This wasn't a lie either, and it made his heart swell with pride for some reason. _His_ partner, one of the youngest judges in history.

He tried to hold on to that feeling as his eyes finally shifted to the last pile. His hands shook slightly as he combed through them, letting it all sink in again.

The images of the crash were the worst. Objectively, he knew that Michael was almost impossible to kill. He had watched the man's head explode (twice!) for God's sake, not to mention the insane amount of drugs that by all means should have put him in a coma, at the very least.

Still, the twisted metal and shattered glass made him sick with unease. The thought of Michael trapped in there, in pain and alone, was enough to shake him. He wished desperately to go home and hug the man; he felt like he needed to reaffirm that his partner was indeed whole and alive.

The rest was mostly a blur of medical files and reports, scattered with the occasional police report and mugshot. There was a lot of medical jargon he didn't understand, but the overarching theme seemed pretty clear; whatever the accident knocked loose in Michael's head, a long line of shrinks and physicians thought antipsychotic drugs and mental hospitalization was the answer.

To look at the dates, it seem to work for a while. Until it didn't, and the police reports entered the mix.

Then it all just... stopped. No more police reports, no more 5150's, nothing.

That was the point when Dan assumed that The Chief had finally stepped in and created Cracked.

Speaking of, Dan glanced at his phone as it began to ring, the mysterious symbols once again flashing on his screen. He answered.

"You have questions," The Chief's voice slid hauntingly over the line, and Dan nodded, forgetting The Chief couldn't see him.

"Why didn't you help them?" Dan's eyes slid to the first two piles of paper; Michael's academic achievements and the eviction notices, "Michael barely lived in one place for more than a year, why didn't you help them?"

"I'm an immortal, supernatural being, OBrien," The Chief's voice came terse and emotionless through the phone's tiny speaker, "I've fucked a lot of people throughout history. I didn't even know Michael existed until the crash brought his abilities to the surface."

"Explain that," Dan prompted, "How did he go from county's youngest judge to a stack of psychoanalysis longer than _War and Peace_?"

"Michael's abilities didn't manifest until after the accident. You can't even begin to comprehend what it would be like to go from your measly five senses to being able to see the entire schematic of the universe laid out in front of you. He had no idea how to control it; of course it drove him mad."

Dan considered the long list of unpronounceable antipsychotic drugs in Michael's file. So many things about his partner were starting to make sense, and he looked at all the papers scattered across his desk.

"That's how he drew the attention of the Order."

"Correct."

"And you hid him," Daniel murmured, "So they'd get off his trail."

"Yes," The Chief answered, and he almost sounded... sad, "I want you to understand something O'Brien."

Dan remained silent, waiting, "When I figured out that Michael was my son, I tried to help him control his powers. I wanted to be able to bring him into Chief's Order, as is his birthright. But he was too far gone. Damage control was the best I could do; his brain was just too jumbled and scattered."

Daniel was quiet for several long moments.

"He's clearer with you," The Chief commented eventually, and Dan blinked rapidly in surprise, "You must have noticed by now. How else do you think you're still alive?"

It was a question Daniel had been asking himself for quite some time, and he still didn't have an answer.

"Why am I so special?" he asked aloud for once, "What about me makes me anything extraordinary?"

"No idea," The Chief answered honestly, "You still seem like a pussy to me."

Dan's neck heated, and he grit his teeth.

"But it doesn't matter. You're the only person I can trust with him, O'Brien. Don't fuck it up. And I expect that file neatly packed back up before you leave."

The line went dead.

Daniel stared at his phone dumbly, mind turning over everything he had learned in the last few hours.

He realized how tired he was, the emotional rollercoaster he had been on all day taking its toll.

It was time to go home to his partner.

As instructed, he re-packed the binder and left it at the corner of his desk. He knew that it would be gone before he even left the room, and he didn't allow himself to ask how.

It seemed to be weirdly fitting that it was raining when he left the building. Water flecked his glasses as the sound of distant thunder rolled overhead.

By the time he arrived at his apartment, the storm was in full swing, and he ran as fast as he could from his car to the safety of their building. Still panting, he let himself into their little basement apartment.

"About time!"

The water droplets on his glasses gave the world a weird, speckled look, but he could still see Michael's head peeking out from what appeared to be a blanket fort it he had constructed at the foot of their bed.

"Hurry up, Bruce Willis is about to push Alan Rickman off the building!"

Dan smiled as he hung up his coat. Of course Michael had build his blanket fort around the television.

"Daniel, come on!"

"I'm coming Micheal, give me a minute!"

" _You're going to miss it!"_

"Alright, alright," Dan sighed, shrugging out of his shirt as he toed off his shoes. He was soaking wet and shivering slightly with cold; stripping down to his underwear and cuddling with Michael's impossibly warm body while watching _Die Hard_ sounded like heaven.

He wiped his glasses off on his dry undershirt as he made his way over to the opening in the blankets and crawled inside.

He was immediately grabbed by Michael and manhandled into being the little spoon on the pile of blankets and pillows on the floor.

"Shhh!" Michael hissed loudly, wrapping his arm around Dan's chest in a tight grip.

"I didn't even say anything," Dan murmured, and Michael shushed him again.

On the screen, Hans Gruber was falling in slow motion while the climatic music swelled, and Dan sighed as he settled in against Michael's solid warmth.

"Wrecked, son!" Michael cheered as Hans finally landed with a crunch, and Daniel chuckled.

The rest of the movie played out, and Michael sighed with contentment as the credit started to roll.

"Man, what a movie," Michael chirped, and Daniel nodded in agreement, taking his glasses off and putting them next to the TV before settling back down comfortably.

With a satisfied hum Michael snuggled closer, tightening his arm more snuggly around Dan's chest and angling his head to press his face against Dan's shoulder. Outside, the thunder was moving closer, and the rain made a pleasant white noise behind the sound of the end credit music.

Dan let his mind drift back to everything he had learned that day, and his conversation with The Chief. He was trying not to let it upset him, but the more he thought about it the more it did just that. With a determined huff of breath, he wiggled around in Michael's arms, putting them face to face and wrapping both his arms around the taller man tightly.

Michael grinned a happy smile, returning the embrace wholeheartedly and pressing them forehead-to-forehead and nose-to-nose. Dan felt a bit cross-eyed, looking at Michael from such a close proximity, but he would take that small discomfort in exchange for how content Michael seemed to be.

Idly, Dan put one hand up to stroke through Michael's hair, and Michael purred. Daniel chortled and kept on doing it, petting and gently scratching Michael's head like he was a big cat. Michael's eyes slipped closed, and his whole body seemed to go more lax with contentment the longer Dan pet him.

Dan closed his eyes too, just enjoying the precious moment of quiet Michael was letting him have. Michael would always be contained chaos, and Daniel was fine with that, but he was also surprising affectionate a large part of the time. It was painfully endearing.

 _I'm in love with you._

The thought was not a foreign one, but it was one that he tried to avoid thinking about for too long. It was too complicated, too scary, Too Goddamn Big for Daniel to process when it came to the insane, impossible, _literally magic_ man that was Michael Swaim.

But undeniably, unquestionably true, and coupled with all the things he had learned that day, it was something that Daniel wasn't sure Michael had heard nearly enough.

"I'm in love with you," he found himself whispering, terrified, and Dan had never felt his heart pounding so hard.

Michael's eyes opened, and they just stared at each other for a long moment.

"About damn time!" Michael was smiling like a maniac, and Dan's brows knit in confusion, "I've been waiting forever for you to say it!"

"What?" Daniel squeaked, and Michael's arms squeezed around him tightly.

"Yeah, I mean, obviously. Of course you are, it's so obvious. Knew you'd come around to admitting it eventually."

Dan's face flushed red with embarrassment, and his breath got tight in his chest. Only Michael knew how to throw his world off-balance quite so acutely.

"Right, of course," he sighed bitterly, trying to pull away, but Michael tightened his grip and pressed a hard kiss to Daniel's mouth.

"I love you too, fuckwit," Michael murmured against his lips, "Loved you for ages."

Daniel stopped trying to move away, Michael's words sinking into his chest like warm water.

"Ages?" he questioned softly, and Michael nodded.

"Of course. You just seemed pretty intent on denying it, so I let you come around."

"I... you..." Daniel was speechless, and Michael saved him from his pointless babbling with another kiss. Daniel resigned himself to always be surprised by Michael; the man truly was a walking marvel.

"I'm hungry," Michael abruptly pulled away to announce, "Can we get pizza?"

Daniel sighed and giggled ridiculously at his partner's sudden change of pace, and Michael put on his best puppy face.

"Pleeeeeease?"

Daniel sighed again, rolling his eyes and scrubbing a hand through Michael's hair, "Fine, fine."

"Yaaaaaaaay!"

Michael sprang up, collapsing the blanket fort in his hurry to track down the pizzeria menu in the kitchen. He threw the blankets off his shoulders onto Dan, who flailed for a moment to get out from under them.

"Michael!" Daniel chided as he managed to push them off to the side and sat up with a shake of his head.

"Can we get anchovies and black olives?" Michael asked, staring at the menu as he stood in his pink, plaid boxer shorts and tatty undershirt in the middle of their tiny kitchen. Daniel sighed fondly.

"Half," he negotiated, "Half whatever you want, half just regular pepperoni."

"Boooooring!" Michael groaned, "Have you learned nothing from being my Fabergé?"

"The word you're looking for is protégé, and again, I'm not that either."

"Whatever you say, Dan," Michael said with a pitying look, and Daniel just rolled his eyes with another long-suffering sigh.

"Just hand me the menu and grab my pants, Michael. I need my phone out of the pocket."

Michael grinned and sauntered over, scooping Dan's pants up as he went, before holding both out.

Daniel took them as Michael worked on reconstructing the blanket fort again. Dan chuckled as Michael started reciting the bits of dialogue coming from the _Die Hard_ dvd menu that had been playing in the background for who knows how long.

 _Take care of him, Chew Toy._

Daniel stared for a moment at the text message on his screen, then glanced to his partner.

Michael was by no means the type of person he had ever imagined himself to be with. He was loud, he was strange, he was unpredictable, he was _literal magic_.

And he was Daniel's. Somehow, and completely against all logic.

 _Yes sir._


End file.
